WikiLeaks: Shocking Revelations in Guantanamo Files
More than 700 leaked secret files on the Guantánamo detainees lay bare the inner workings of America's controversial prison camp in Cuba. The US military dossiers, obtained by the New York Times and the Guardian, reveal how, alongside the so-called "worst of the worst", many prisoners were flown to the Guantánamo cages and held captive for years on the flimsiest grounds, or on the basis of lurid confessions extracted by maltreatment. The 759 Guantánamo files, classified "secret", cover almost every inmate since the camp was opened in 2002. More than two years after President Obama ordered the closure of the prison, 172 are still held there. The files depict a system often focused less on containing dangerous terrorists or enemy fighters, than on extracting intelligence. Among inmates who proved harmless were an 89-year-old Afghan villager, suffering from senile dementia, and a 14-year-old boy who had been an innocent kidnap victim.

Ex-Swiss Banker Gives Account Data To WikiLeaks
A former Swiss banker said Monday that he has handed over to WikiLeaks two discs containing what he claims is information on 2,000 offshore bank account holders. Rudolf Elmer, an ex-employee of Swiss-based bank Julius Baer, said the documents reveal case after case of tax evasion and involve 40 politicians as well as entertainers and multinationals from the U.S., the U.K. and elsewhere.

WikiLeaks' Most Terrifying Revelation: Just How Much Our Government Lies to Us
Do you believe that it is in Americans' interest to allow a small group of U.S. leaders to unilaterally murder, maim, imprison and/or torture anyone they choose anywhere in the world, without the knowledge let alone oversight of their citizens or the international community? And, despite their proven record of failure to protect America -- from Indochina to Iran to Iraq -- do you believe they should be permitted to clandestinely expand their war-making without informed public debate? If so, you are betraying the principles upon which America was founded, endangering your nation, and displaying a distinctly "unamerican" subservience to unaccountable authority. But if you oppose autocratic power, you are called to support Wikileaks and others trying to limit U.S. Executive Branch mass murder abroad and failure to protect Americans at home.

Here's Why We Must Fight to Protect Julian Assange
The Espionage Act is a huge danger to our open society; it's been used to send hundreds of dissenters to jail just for voicing their opinions, transforming dissent into treason. The 1917 Act has a notorious history. It originally served to squelch opposition to World War I. It criminalized criticism of the war effort, and sent hundreds of dissenters to jail just for voicing their opinions. It transformed dissent into treason. Many who attacked the law noted that the framers of the Constitution had specifically limited what constituted treason by writing it into the Constituton: “Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort” (Article III, section 3). The framers felt this narrow definition was necessary to prevent treason from becoming what some called “the weapon of a political faction.”

Wikileaks: American Taxpayers Fund Pedophilia Partys
Children were abused on American military dollars. The cables are undoubtedly an embarrassment to the war effort. Whereas previously bacha bazi was used in the media to stress the necessity of the war effort – "these people need to be liberated," so the theory went – the WikiLeaks cables have completely reversed that notion. Americans are clearly not liberators if they are promoting child abuse instead of preventing and prohibiting it. American DynCorp arranged for the boys to be purchased, for the venue, and for the guests who would attend the party. Pedophilia is not a phenomenon exclusive to one culture. It tends to thrive in any situation where males and females are segregated, whether that is a religious institution, a culture of segregated boarding schools, or a closed society.

WikiLeaks reveal BP suffered 2008 well blowout similar to Deepwater Horizon
12.16.10 | WikiLeaks continues to roll out secret diplomatic cables from its cache of a quarter million such communiqués, revealing late Wednesday that energy giant BP dealt with a blowout following a gas leak in the country of Azerbaijan 18 months before the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico.

Julian Assange Won TIME Magazine Readers' Poll
TIME magazine reported that an overwhelming number of its readers had voted for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange as their "person of the year": "Readers voted a total of 1,249,425 times, and the favorite was clear. Julian Assange raked in 382,020 votes, giving him an easy first place." But this morning on the TODAY show, TIME editors unveiled their "Person"--Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, a far less polarizing choice to grace the cover of the weekly magazine.

Michael Moore: Why I Posted Bail for Julian Assange
December 14, 2010 |Yesterday, in the Westminster Magistrates Court in London, the lawyers for WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange presented to the judge a document from me stating that I have put up $20,000 of my own money to help bail Mr. Assange out of jail. Furthermore, I am publicly offering the assistance of my website, my servers, my domain names and anything else I can do to keep WikiLeaks alive and thriving as it continues its work to expose the crimes that were concocted in secret and carried out in our name and with our tax dollars. WikiLeaks exists, in part, because the mainstream media has failed to live up to its responsibility. The corporate owners have decimated newsrooms, making it impossible for good journalists to do their job. There's no time or money anymore for investigative journalism. Simply put, investors don't want those stories exposed. They like their secrets kept ... as secrets.

Espionage Act makes felons of us all
Dear Americans: If you are not "authorized" personnel, but you have read, written about, commented upon, tweeted, spread links by "liking" on Facebook, shared by email, or otherwise discussed "classified" information disclosed from WikiLeaks, you could be implicated for crimes under the U.S. Espionage Act -- or so warns a legal expert who said the U.S. Espionage Act could make "felons of us all."

Latest WikiLeaks Reveal Embarrasses Vatican
The latest revelation from WikiLeaks sheds an embarrassing light on the Vatican, revealing what most already knew: that the Holy See is as embroiled in PR-concerned political negotiations as any other government. As the AP reports, at particular issue was the Vatican and the government of Ireland, which was investigating a major clergy sex-abuse scandal and investigation.

Attacking Websites Is Surprisingly Easy Social Protest
"Participating in acts of electronic civil disobedience is relatively easy," he says. "I think we're going to see — unfortunately — more of these attacks in the future, just because they are so easy to carry out and relatively difficult to defend against."

Nine Weird Things About the WikiLeaks Story
December 6, 2010 | The release of the US embassy cables has thus far been one of the most... interesting moments in recent US (and World) history, impacting global politics in a way that is unprecedented. Nestled amid the outrage and debate are some truly weird aspects that make the brouhaha seem like a lost installment in the Jason Bourne chronicles (or Catch Me If You Can). More important than the drama and gossip, WikiLeaks is a tentpost in the information age, a milestone potentially heralding a new era of internet transparency. As world governments balk at the exposure of their secrets -- and scramble to suppress the information -- Assange and his crew are expressing their right to free speech and facilitating the public's fundamental right to know exactly what their leaders are up to, particularly when it entails wars, torture, and secret military action. Here are the 8 craziest facets of the international uproar surrounding WikiLeaks and Julian Assange.

Hackers Give Web Companies a Test of Free Speech
On Wednesday, anonymous hackers took aim at companies perceived to have harmed WikiLeaks after its release of a flood of confidential diplomatic documents. MasterCard, Visa and PayPal. Marcia Hofmann, a lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said, “Any Internet user who cares about free speech or has a controversial or unpopular message should be concerned about the fact that intermediaries might not let them express it.” She added, “Your free speech rights are only as strong as the weakest intermediary.”

Freedom of the Press?
"The field of battle is WikiLeaks," wrote John Perry Barlow, a former Grateful Dead lyricist and founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the First Amendment advocacy group, in a message to his followers. "You are the troops." WikiLeaks admiringly forwarded the post to 300,000 of its own followers. As the U.S. and other governments attempted to close down WikiLeaks over the past week, those "troops" have fought back. And so far, it doesn't look like much of a contest.

Wikileaks: Have hackers triggered a cyber war?
Mastercard acknowledged there had been 'a service disruption' After hackers temporarily shut down the websites of the one of world's biggest credit card companies, Mastercard, there is growing concern about the spreading cyber war of attacks and counter-attacks.

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